The latest recipients of the Arts Council England’s Ambition for Excellence awards have been announced. A total of £1,757,500 will be split between four organisations across the UK: Future Everything CIC (Manchester), Heart of Glass (St Helens), Collusion (Cambridge) and the University of Reading.
The awards are aimed at ‘stimulating and supporting ambition, talent and excellence across the country’.
Future Everything CIC has been awarded £450,000 for FAULT LINES, a talent development and commissioning programme. Artists will be supported to develop new work outside their usual art forms and collaborate with technology and research partners.
This will include partnering with Manchester International Festival and working with a soon to be announced high profile artist.
Collusion has been awarded £325,000 for in_collusion, a three year project which will bring artists, academics, and technologists together to work on interactive artworks in Cambridge. This will also include five additional hubs in Bury St Edmunds, Huntingdon, King’s Lynn, Peterborough and Wisbech.
Heart of Glass has been awarded £487,500 for a collaborative project with different communities of women from across the town of St-Helens. Working with partners ANU Productions and contemporary art organisation idle women, Heart of Glass will use genealogy, unconventional practices and historical research to explore the personal everyday histories of women.
The University of Reading will receive £495,000 to help fund Reading International – a collaboration with Reading Borough Council, Artangel and a coalition of local arts organisations. This three year programme will include an exhibition in the Victorian architecture of Reading Prison and a site-specific project in the Reading Abbey Ruins.
Amy Vaughan, senior selationship manager and acting lead for Ambition for Excellence at Arts Council England said that the projects take a step forward in the use of digital technologies. She commented: “Digital technology is transforming the way we make, distribute, receive and exchange art. Some of these projects will build new partnerships, invite new perspectives and use digital platforms to bring existing work to wider audiences.”
The Arts Council are aiming for 80-90% of the total £35m Ambition for Excellence fund to be committed outside London, supporting their target of a minimum of 75% of Lottery funding committed outside the capital by 2018.
Images:
1. FutureEverything awarded £450,000 funding from Arts Council England’s Ambition for Excellence fund
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